“With the continued love and support of my wife, Nita, I have exhausted all options,” Killebrew said in a statement Friday. He added: “I have spent the past decade of my life promoting hospice care and educating people on its benefits. I am very comfortable taking this next step and experiencing the compassionate care that hospice provides.”

Killebrew was receiving treatment at a branch of the Mayo Clinic nearby after his diagnosis in December. He expressed optimism at the time, saying he expected to make a full recovery while acknowledging he was in “perhaps the most difficult battle” of his life.

Hall of Fame manager Sparky Anderson, who guided Cincinnati Reds “Big Red Machine” to back-to-back World Series championships and went on to win another title with the Detroit Tigers, died this morning at the age of 76.

One of the greatest managers of all-time. I always enjoyed watching him in Detroit…I wasn’t born when he led the Reds to their World Series championships).

Anderson died from complications from dementia, family spokesman Dan Ewald said. A day earlier, Anderson’s family said he had been placed in hospice care.

Anderson was the first manager to win World Series titles in both leagues and the only manager to lead two franchises in career wins.

His total of 2,194 wins as a manager were the third highest when he retired after the 1995 season, trailing only Connie Mack and John McGraw.

Ewald knew Anderson for about 35 years as a former Tigers spokesman and baseball writer for the Detroit News.

“Sparky Anderson will always be measured by his number of victories and his place in baseball’s Hall of Fame. But all of that is overshadowed by the type of person he was. Sparky not only spiked life into baseball, he gave life in general something to smile about. Never in my lifetime have I met a man as gentle, kind and courageous as Sparky,” he said.

Alex Rodriguez became the youngest player in Major League Baseball history to hit 600 home runs with a 1st inning, 2 run shot off of Shaun Marcum of the Toronto Blue Jays today.

Rodriguez is the seventh player in baseball history to reach 600 career home runs, only trailing Barry Bonds, Hank Aaron, Babe Ruth, Willie Mays, Ken Griffey Jr. and Sammy Sosa on the all-time list.

Congrats to Rodriguez on this achievement. Now, let’s see if he can catch Bonds.

Speaking of which…do we need to bring up the steroid issue? Should an “*” be put next to Arod’s name? How about the rest of the sluggers in the Steroid Era.

I hate to bring it up as Rodriguez hits this milestone, but you know that it will be discussed.

How does ARod fit into the Hall of Fame picture? Does he deserve a spot more than a player like Pete Rose who bet on baseball (don’t get me started on this topic as I always have, and always will believe that Rose deserves a spot in Cooperstown).

The home run king will always be Hank Aaron, in my opinion.

Guys like Aaron, Babe Ruth and Willie Mays, in my mind, are the top three on the list and we won’t see anyone in our generation knock them out, no matter what statistics show.

Statistics don’t include performance enhancing drugs and that is an unfair advantage that players had during the Steroid Era. Some got caught, some didn’t. But everyone knew it was happening and only now are we seeing how much of an effect it had on baseball as a whole.

I do feel bad for those players who didn’t because they will always be lumped into the category with the McGwire’s, Sosa’s and Canseco’s. I really wish that I could have lived and seen some of the all-time greats of baseball’s Golden Era play. What a thrill that must have been!

It appears that former New York Giants star Lawrence Taylor has been arrested and accused of rape in New York. From what I’ve read this morning, the accuser is a 15 year old girl! I’m sure more information will come out in the coming days.

Taylor, who spent his entire NFL career with the Giants, has always gone by the nickname LT. He is considered one of the greatest defensive players in NFL history. He also gained recent notoriety on the television program Dancing With the Stars.

With player movement still minimal so far, the biggest bombshell at baseball’s winter meetings is the announcement on Tuesday that legendary MLB journalist Peter Gammons is leaving ESPN. Gammons leaves after a 21-year run at the network, preceded by five years at Sports Illustrated and a long career at the Boston Globe, during which he covered the Red Sox teams of Carl Yastrzemski, Jim Rice and Roger Clemens.

Gammons, 64, is known for his tireless work and old school penchant for getting information. In a crowded media landscape in which sports pundits look to stand out with loud voices and strong opinions, Gammons’ baseball reports hum along in print and on-air with detached analysis and conversational style.

As expected, Alex Rodriguez admitted in an interview with ESPN on Monday that he used performance-enhancing drugs for several seasons at the beginning of this decade, but he said he has not used the substances since then.

So, what will this do to his image, his credibility, his chances of making the Hall of Fame?

Who’s next? Rodriguez surely isn’t the only player who has used performance enhancing drugs. Who do you think it will be? Pujols, Ortiz, Ramirez?

“When I arrived at Texas in 2001 I felt an enormous amount of pressure to perform,” Rodriguez told Peter Gammons.

He added: “Back then it was a different culture. It was loose. I was young. I was stupid. I was naïve. And I wanted to prove to everyone that I was worth being one of the greatest players of all time. I did take a banned substance, and for that I am very sorry and deeply regretful.”

The acknowledgment by Rodriguez came two days after Sports Illustrated’s Web site, SI.com, reported that Rodriguez had tested positive for steroids in 2003, when he was in his last season with the Texas Rangers and won the first of his three Most Valuable Player awards.

The next season, Rodriguez joined the Yankees. He is now the highest paid player in baseball and widely viewed as the most talented.

Rodriguez said he did not know exactly what substances he took, but that he hadn’t taken substances since 2003.

“I am guilty of being negligent, naïve, not asking all the right questions,” Rodriguez, the Yankees’ third baseman, said.

The test results from 2003 were never supposed to be made public. Drug testing in baseball that season — the first time it had even taken place — was done on an anonymous survey basis, and even the players were not supposed to know the results.

Until now, Rodriguez had never been publicly linked to a positive drug test. His acknowledgment that he tested positive may serve to quiet some of the uproar the disclosure of his positive test has created. Nevertheless, the fact that he is now admitting he took performance-enhancing substances for several seasons will damage his image and his legacy as a player.

Ms. Yow, first diagnosed with the disease in 1987, died yesterday morning at WakeMed Cary Hospital after being admitted last week, said Annabelle Myers, university spokeswoman.

“I think she understood that keeping going was inspirational to other people who were in the same boat,” Dr. Mark Graham, Ms. Yow’s longtime oncologist, said yesterday.

Ms. Yow won more than 700 games in a career filled with milestones. She coached the US Olympic team to a gold medal in 1988, won four Atlantic Coast Conference tournament championships, earned 20 NCAA tournament bids, and reached the Final Four in 1998.

She also was inducted into the Naismith Hall of Fame in 2002, and the school dedicated “Kay Yow Court” in Reynolds Coliseum in 2007.

But for many fans, Ms. Yow was best defined by her unwavering resolve while fighting cancer, from raising awareness and money for research to staying with her team through the debilitating effects of the disease and chemotherapy treatments.

She served on the board of the V Foundation for Cancer Research, which was founded by ESPN and a friend and colleague, former N.C. State men’s coach Jim Valvano, who died of cancer in 1993.

“Kay taught us all to live life with passion and to never give up,” said fellow board member George Bodenheimer, president of ESPN and ABC Sports. He said the network would remain committed to a research fund established in Ms. Yow’s name.

“She’s a driving force for what’s going on today in the battle against cancer,” ESPN commentator and former Notre Dame men’s coach Digger Phelps said.

At Duke, one of N.C. State’s closest ACC rivals, there was a moment of silence to honor Ms. Yow before the men’s basketball game yesterday.